Wells Fargo

John,

It takes longer for bills to get here and longer for creditors to receive your payment via USPS. If you have a PO Box that could add to the lag if you don't check it every day. Furthermore, the bill pay feature for Banco Popular and Bank of St. Croix is very basic. Therefore, I use Wells Fargo to pay creditors on the mainland. It's much faster and means avoiding late charges. However, you have to mail deposits to Wells Fargo since there is no branch here. Furthermore, local banks will put a 10 day hold on a Wells Fargo check that you deposit even though it clears your account in a couple of days.

I use a local bank for local bills. What I don't know is whether there is any reluctance by local merchants to accept a check from a mainland bank.

I use First Bank VI for local bills and kept my Bank of America account for mainland bills. However I must say First Bank VI's bill pay system is at least as good as BOA's and for major U.S. accounts they can pay same day if I initiate payment by 2 PM which is something I can't do with BOA.

I think I'll keep BOA if only because I need something when I travel to the U.S. but First Bank VI has been pretty good when it comes to bill payment. Make sure you get direct deposit if you can for any account you setup here as it can take an hour just to deposit a check at local banks.

Bank of St Croix just updated their online bill-pay system within the last month and they're now using the exact same system that my bank on the mainland was using. I haven't had any problems with payment being late through using their bill pay system.

Thanks. Think I'll keep WF online if and when. How's the ATM/Debit card situation? Fees, no fees?